


Don't Drink the Soup

by potofsoup



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Chinese Mythology - Freeform, M/M, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-27
Updated: 2014-12-27
Packaged: 2019-10-31 18:51:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17855168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/potofsoup/pseuds/potofsoup
Summary: A Chinese mythology interpretation of Steve and Bucky and concepts of reincarnation.From Dec 2014





	Don't Drink the Soup

**Author's Note:**

> a response to a "soulmates" prompt from itstheclimb17. Many thanks to rinforthewin whose [reblog](https://potofsoup2.tumblr.com/post/180367229318/rinforthewin-potofsoup-itstheclimb17-is) saved it!

After Steve finally fell asleep and Mrs. Rogers came back from the pharmacist, Bucky slipped onto the fire escape. He didn’t want to cry in front of Mrs. Rogers, not when both of them knew Steve was so close to death.

So there he was, sitting with his back against the window, hands shaking from the cold and shoulders shaking from the sobbing, his tears frozen on his face, when he heard a voice.

“It’s all right, little Bucky — go in and tell him not to drink the soup.”

Bucky looked up, embarrassed to have forgotten about Mister Wan.

Technically Mr. Wan lived upstairs from Steve, but as far as Bucky could tell, he seemed to liver permanently on the fire escape. “Good breeze tonight,” he’d say as they clambered out to chat or read. Sometimes he’d tell stories about working on the railroad and then riding it as far east as it would go, about the bill that passed in congress that kept him from seeing his family the last 30 years. 

“What soup?" Bucky asked. Mr. Wan always had something interesting to say.

Mr. Wan scratched his chin and tried to explain. “After you die, your ghost walks the path of the yellow stream until you come to the Naihe bridge. Crossing the bridge sends you to your next life, but first Mother Meng gives you soup. Drinking the soup will make you forget your past life. Little Steve — tell him not to drink the soup. If he remembers this life, he can find you again when he is reborn.”

Bucky was pretty sure that’s not how it worked. But then again believing in God hasn’t stopped Steve from talking about banshees and selkies, and Bucky was always one to hedge his bets. "Just don’t drink the soup on the bridge? That doesn’t sound so hard.”

Mr. Wan shrugged. “The soup is very warm and delicious, and ghosts tend to be cold and hungry.” His finger traced a scar on his right hand. “And sometimes, you’d rather forget your past life.”

Bucky decided to leave Mr. Wan to his memories, so he wiped his face and straightened his hair and went back in to tell Steve about the soup.

It all seemed rather silly coming out of his mouth, not being Chinese and all. Bucky was sort of glad that Steve was probably asleep and or at least not awake enough to tease Bucky about it. Anyways, the next day Steve started getting better and Bucky plumb forgot about it.

———

A month later, Steve nearly got the two of them killed in a knife fight. Afterward, they were sitting in Steve’s bathroom, trying not to bleed over everything as Steve stitched together the gash on Bucky’s forearm, when out of nowhere Steve said, "Maybe you should drink the soup on the bridge – probably prefer to forget this.”

It took a moment for Bucky to figure out that Steve was talking about Mr. Wan’s story. The idiot always came up with the worst ways to apologize. “Well, you *are* a little shit that gets me into way too much trouble most days….” Bucky let Steve stew on that for a second before grabbing Steve’s shoulder with his free, non-bloody hand. "Just kidding, Steve. Hanging with you’ll probably get us both killed one day, but I’d *never* drink anything that’d make me forget you.”

The grin that Steve flashed him then … Bucky sure as hell didn’t want to forget that.

——

And so it became a thing between them.

When a double date went sour, Bucky’d say, “Bet you’d drink the soup after *that* particular disaster.”

When Steve has been coughing non-stop for 2 days straight, Bucky’d raise an eyebrow as he tried to feed Steve some chicken soup, “while we’re at it, you might as well drink the soup on the bridge…”

When the illness gets worse and Bucky’s hid himself into a corner, too worried about Steve’s health to even distract himself properly, Steve’d say, “You better not drink the soup just to forget my stinky death smell.”

When Steve got turned down from yet another factory job and was told to “collect more scrap metal, kid,” Bucky’d say, “They’re all idiots and you should just drink the soup and forget about them.”

When the mail from Uncle Sam started showing up, full of forms to fill and glowing words about service and patriotism, Steve’d sit next to Bucky and say, simply, “Soup?”

And that was always enough to pull Bucky out of his dark thoughts, at least long enough to remember why everything else was worth living through. Long enough to smile and reply, “Never.”

———

Bucky wasn’t a bit surprised that he died first.

———-

Being a ghost was different from what he expected. There were no shining heavenly light, no hell fire. Just a lot of pain, a lot of hunger, and a lot of tasks. Perhaps that’s what it meant to walk on the path of the yellow stream.

He forgot a lot of things as a ghost, it was easier to deal with the pain that way. He forgot things that didn’t matter to a ghost: his name, the significance of events, the meaning behind ideas. But there was one thing that he clung to. Someone on a bridge. Something that he shouldn’t drink.  
He couldn’t remember what he shouldn’t drink, and why. But no matter how cold and hungry he got as a ghost, he didn’t drink any milk, any juice, any soup. The demons that tormented him soon learned to inject their potions.

He lost track of how long he’d been a vengeful ghost. Sometimes it felt like that was all there was: being sent to take lives and then cold and forgetting. A part of him seemed to remember that hell was supposed to last forever. But he also remembered that eventually there would be a bridge, a person on the bridge, and across the bridge, his next life.

He waited.

———

Finally he found the bridge, and on the bridge, the man he couldn’t kill.

He crossed the bridge and was reborn.

———

In his new life, Bucky remembered. First came all the memories of the experiments on his body, the long years of cold. Then came all the memories of all the people he’d killed, all the parts of him that are broken and wrong. It made Bucky want to forget – he drank everything that he’d abstained from as a ghost. None of it worked and Bucky thought about becoming a ghost again. But then came the memories of Steve – Steve the little shit who wouldn’t back down, Steve the fool who could talk Bucky’s ear off in private but barely mutter two words in front of a girl, Steve the idealistic idiot who managed to make spangly tights look natural and blind patriotism look awkward. Bucky remembered how to smile.

So Bucky found out where Steve lived and knocked on his door.

“Hey, Steve. Sure took your time getting reborn. Hope you didn’t drink any of the soup on that bridge.”

And as Steve took Bucky in his arms, he muttered in Bucky’s ear the one vow that was certain and eternal like nothing else. “Never.”

**Author's Note:**

> \- The bridge in Chinese mythology is called Naihe 奈何, and spans the Wangchuan river of forgetfulness. The soup is made out of water from the Wangchuan, so it’s kind of Lethe-y. Before drinking the soup, you are shown your previous lives, and after you cross the bridge, you go to the underworld for judgement and rebirth. (Although in some versions you’re judged first and then instantly reborn after crossing the bridge.)
> 
> \- I *really* like the idea of the Winter Soldier as a Chinese-style ghost. First there’s the concept of a 孤魂野鬼 – a lonely ghost who wanders the world pursuing their last dying desire, never getting rest or a chance to reincarnate. For example, if you die of hunger (which happened a lot back then), you’d be a hungry ghost who would eat but never be full. Lonely, lost, wanting to move on but trapped in a warped version of your former self – fits certain interpretations of WS (trapped as “protective killer”, with a misguided sense of who he’s protecting), but also works really well for post-ice Steve (trapped as “super soldier”, but with no sense of what he’s fighting for). Then there’s the 索命鬼: vengeful ghosts that are elevated to servant demons of the underworld, sent to reap the lives of the living. They’re basically mindless assassins for the king of the underworld. Winter Soldier much? ;D
> 
> \- In the underworld, you get punished for all the evil that you have done in your life before you are sent for rebirth, so I kind of wanted to present Bucky’s stint as the Winter Soldier as him serving out his term in the underworld – first the pain and punishment until you forget your previous life, and then being a demon grim reaper. (Plus the underworld has both hot hell *and* cold hell!) I wish the mythology was less ambiguous about whether the bridge and the soup come before the underworld punishment or after.


End file.
